It’s empathy day today – so here is the fabulous poem by Kate Wakeling about Rosa Parks, in Shaping the World, 40 Historical Heroes in Verse.
Have a lovely Empathy Day everyone! Head over to https://www.empathylab.uk/ or @EmpathyLabUK for more information!
Aged 9, Severn Suzuki founded the Children’s Environmental Organisation. In 1992, long before Greta Thunberg, aged 12, she and three friends raised the money to travel from Canada to speak at the Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit, to fight for their future and give a young person’s perspective on environmental issues. In 1993, she was honoured in the United Nation’s Environment Programme’s Global 500 Roll of Honour. Sill fighting for the environment, she is now also a speaker, television host and author.
A Child Speaks
Butterflies
are disappearing
like my breath on a windowpane
you would think
this clear view
would help them see
but no
maybe the last, gentle orangutan?
no
perhaps the ocean
lapping with plastic bottles?
no
possibly the last bee?
no
we save the rights
of those with a voice
but we are the undefended
the last tiger walking
and all the adults do is talk
about talking
© Liz Brownlee
Another #EmpathyDay poem – again from Be the Change, Poems to Help You Save the World, written with Matt Goodfellow and Roger Stevens, Macmillan.
9-year old Katie Stagliano brought home a tiny cabbage seedling as part of a school project, and tended it so well it became an enormous 40lb cabbage! She donated it to a soup kitchen where it fed 275 people. Katie decided to start vegetable gardens so that she could donate the produce to help people in need. Katie’s Krops now has 100 gardens across the US, helping feed people in need.
Feeding the World
One cabbage seedling,
with small stems bowed
and pale leaves furled,
given food and water
and love can grow
a heart to feed the world.
© Liz Brownlee
Image from Bayer CropScience UK by creative commons license and changed by removing the background.
I’m posting lots of empathy poems today! Here is one about snow, and small gifts. This poem is in Be the Change, Poems to Help You Save the World, written with Matt Goodfellow and Roger Stevens, Macmillan.
Snow
Swirling slowly
in lilting flight,
as cold as stars,
the soundless white
of drifting feathers
spreading wings,
to sing the songs
that snowflakes sing,
of how small gifts
of peace and light
can change the world
in just one night.
© Liz Brownlee
Image by Bert Reimer on Flikr by creative commons license.
This poem is in The Same Inside, Poems about Empathy and Friendship by me, Matt Goodfellow and Roger Stevens, Macmillan
Refugee
After the bombing
and all are lost
and gone
I walk
I can carry only
my father’s pride
my mother’s longing
my brother’s blood
my sister’s hope
and my dreams
but my father’s pride
cannot be carried
as a refugee
so I lay it down
and walk
when I sleep
my mother’s longing
is too painful to hold
so I lay it down
and walk
until my shoes
fall off my feet
and I leave
my brother’s blood
and my own
on the road
as if it is worthless
and I walk
so far and
sleep so little
I cannot remember
my dreams
so I lay them down
I can carry only
my sister’s hope
which is light
in my heart
© Liz Brownlee
Another poem for EmpathyDay! I have permission to post another poem from our forthcoming collection of mental health poems for primary school age – Being Me, Poems about Thoughts, Worries and Feelings, Otter-Barry Books, by me, Matt Goodfellow and Laura Mucha.
It’s empathy day! Here’s another poem about empathy. This is from Reach the Stars, Poems about Extraordinary Women and Girls, by me, Jan Dean and Michaela Morgan, Macmillan.
Helen Keller lost both her sight and hearing as a baby. She became very frustrated as a child, living in silence and darkness until her family employed Anne Sullivan. Despite being partially blind herself, she cleverly found ways to help Helen communicate. Anne was Helen’s teacher, support and companion for the next 49 years until she died – by then, she had enabled Helen get to college, learn to type, speak, get married, tackle social and political issues, including women’s suffrage, and write a book.
Anne Sullivan, Teacher to Helen Keller
I started with the word for ‘doll’,
finger-spelling on her hand.
This child could neither hear, nor see –
how could I help her understand?
To fill the space for song and bird,
all that sound and light explain;
out of reach did not exist
and dark and silence had no name.
Until I spelled into her hand
under a pump – though deaf and blind,
the word for water and the water
flowed together in her mind.
That living word grew in her hands,
gave her ways to hear and see,
let in hope and joy and love
with words that set her free.
© Liz Brownlee
Today it’s empathy day! I have permission to post this poem from a forthcoming collection of mental health poems for primary school age – Being Me, Poems about Thoughts, Worries and Feelings, Otter-Barry Books, by me, Matt Goodfellow and Laura Mucha. This is just a placeholder image – we have a fabulous illustrator on board!
Poetry Roundabout 